Prehistoric Spectacles
Prehistoric Spectacle
Guest:\xa0Lukas Rieppel, Associate Professor of History at Brown University and author of "Assembling the Dinosaur: Fossil Hunters, Tycoons, and the Making of a Spectacle"
Our idea of dinosaurs has been shaped since their discovery by both scientists and showmen. Financial giants of the Gilded Age, such as Andrew Carnegie, took a special philanthropic interest in the dinosaur craze, which benefited both paleontologists and those trying to capitalize on the creatures.
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Dinosaur Treasure
Guest: Caleb Brown, Curator of Dinosaur Systematics and Evolution at the Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology, Alberta, Canada
In March 2011, a mechanical shovel operator accidentally stumbled on a mummified dinosaur.\xa0 It was so well preserved that the contents of its guts were still inside. What we learn from this amazing specimen.
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Scientists Learn Big Lessons from Tiny Dinosaur Dandruff
Guest: Mike Benton, Professor of Vertebrate Palaeontology at the University of Bristol
When you have a chance to visit a dinosaur museum, it\u2019s easy to feel small next to a 20- to 30-foot long skeleton of, say, a stegosaurus. But it\u2019s fun to imagine paleontologists assembling all those massive bones and plates to solve the puzzle of what dinosaurs looked like. Except, the puzzle isn\u2019t really complete once the skeleton is put back together again. Because, there\u2019s the skin to consider . . . and feathers. And, scientists now even look at dinosaur dandruff to figure out how these creatures moved. Because something as small as a flake of skin can actually be just as important to understanding these creatures as a skull, or a leg bone.